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Nonagenarian appointed Society President

At almost 90 years of age and with 60 years of teaching experience at the RCSI, Mr Harold Browne has become President of the College’s Biological Society.

Outgoing Biological Society President Prof Mary Leader said Society members had over the years made several attempts to get Mr Browne to be their President and were delighted that they had finally been successful. She handed the Surgeon Prosector the Chain of Office at the recent 79th Biological Society Inaugural Meeting.

In his acceptance speech, Mr Browne took the audience back to his early days as a UCD student in 1938, through his time working in the US before coming home to Ireland to take up a position at the RCSI, which he still held. Next year, he is set to mark 60 years of teaching there.

In his talk entitled ‘The Patient and the Doctor’, the Surgeon Prosector highlighted the importance of doctors engaging with their patients, a skill he felt some doctors did not hold in high regard, yet which could be the most important skill they had.

Failure to listen to patients was one of the leading factors in malpractice cases and, more importantly, listening and talking to patients led to the provision of the best care possible, he added.